Kuwait City, Kuwait

On Monday morning, May 2, the National Assembly of Kuwait, to the disappointment of the royal-family led government, refused to take the final step necessary to give women the right to vote in municipal elections. This calls into doubt the present parliament's capacity to grant women the right to vote for, or serve in, the National Assembly itself--a right the government has for several years been supporting without finding a majority of legislators to join it.

It's not every constitutional monarchy in which the government is more progressive than the parliament. Nor is it every government that invites journalists and scholars, as Kuwait's invited me, to meet with an assortment of citizens and to explore what many members of the government regard as an embarrassment--the denial, despite the promise of equality for all citizens in the country's constitution, of the right of political participation to women. Then again, Kuwait is no ordinary country.

It's tiny, a little smaller than New Jersey. The land is flat, rocky desert. It's home to 1 million citizens, and hosts approximately 1.3 million guest workers. The principal population center, Kuwait City, is built along one of the few natural harbors on the Arab side of the gulf.

For almost 200 years, from the late 18th century until the early 1950s, the economy was based on pearl diving, fishing, and trading, which resulted in the men spending up to six months at a time at sea. In their absence, the women not only ran the homes but also managed civic life and so developed habits of self-reliance. Kuwait is now, and has been, a staunch ally of the United States. The kingdom served as a launching ground for Operation Iraqi Freedom. And it sits atop 10 percent of the world's proven oil reserves.

In many respects Kuwaiti women are the freest in the Gulf. They enjoy the right to speak, to travel, to own property, to dress as they please, to get an education, to practice law, medicine, business, or almost any job they might choose. They excel at their studies and account for a majority of the students in many of the faculties at Kuwait University, including the College of Islamic Law. Quotas have been imposed in engineering to save room for men. In 1993 Fayza al-Khorafi was named president of KU and so became the first Arab woman to lead an Arab university. Nabila al-Mulla, currently Kuwait's ambassador to the United Nations, is the first Arab-Muslim woman to represent her country in that position.

So if they have achieved so much, why do Kuwaiti women still lack the right to vote in national elections, to run for national office, or to serve as judges? And why do so many Kuwaiti women, including the well-to-do and well-educated, seem not to mind terribly much?

I took this puzzle up two days before the National Assembly decision with Dr. Mohammed Al Moqatei, professor and vice dean at the Kuwait University School of Law. Speaking to me in the traditional Arab white robe and head covering (worn by the great majority of men in Kuwait), he told me that women are flourishing in the study, teaching, and practice of law. And his tone and demeanor suggested that he is comfortable with their success.